Authors: Catrin Collier
‘Maggie …’
‘I’m serious, Judy. Mark my words. He’ll be lucky to get home in one piece tonight.’
‘A letter came for you, Mrs Rees.’ Harriet handed Diana an envelope. ‘I found it under the door when I opened the shop this morning.’
Diana glanced at the handwriting, and failed to recognise it, but a queasy feeling of foreboding stole into her stomach. She tore it open, took one look at the signature at the bottom of the page and pushed it into the pocket of her jacket. ‘Just a bill from a wholesaler. Now, if you open the till I’ll show you how to subtract the takings from the float for the midday banking.’
‘Sorry I’m late.’
‘You are five minutes early.’ Huw Davies lifted his cap and ran his fingers over his bald crown, smoothing back the tufts of ginger hair at the sides of his head. He felt as clumsy and awkward as when he’d first taken a girl out, nearly thirty years before. He’d been sixteen, she fifteen, and he had bought her an ice cream from a cart in the park. Afterwards neither of them had known what to do, so they had hung around foolishly until the park keeper had evicted them when he’d closed the gates. He only hoped this outing was going to end on a more promising note. ‘Would you like something to eat or drink before we go? The buffet’s open.’
Myrtle shook her head as she stole a sideways glance at him. He looked different out of uniform: shorter without the added height of his helmet, and broader dressed in tweeds. ‘No, thank you. Megan let me sleep in this morning. I only finished breakfast a couple of hours ago.’ She followed him out of the booking hall and up the steps that led to the platforms.
She stood alongside him as they waited for the train, not quite sure what to do with her hands. He hadn’t offered her his arm. Did that mean he regarded her as nothing more than a distant relation through marriage?
‘I bought a
South Wales Echo
to see what’s showing in the pictures in Cardiff. If you’re not in a hurry to get back tonight we could have lunch, spend the afternoon looking at the shops, and finish up with a film. Jesse James is on in the Capitol. But then perhaps you don’t like Westerns?’ he suggested diffidently.
‘I like all kinds of films. Well, almost all kinds,’ she amended, blushing at her eagerness to please. ‘And I’ll watch anything that has Tyrone Power in it.’
The train drew in. Huw walked along the platform ahead of her, and held the carriage door open.
‘That’s first class,’ she said, preparing to walk back to third.
‘I thought I’d splash out. Special occasion, first outing and all that.’
He helped her up the steps and through the door. She sat back in her seat trying not to look overwhelmed at the unaccustomed extravagance, hoping that his gesture meant that he intended to ask her out again. If only she could think of something witty and amusing to say, something that would make him laugh and at ease with her. The way the men in the factory were with Judy Crofter and the other young girls who never seemed to be nervous and tongue-tied when they were in male company.
Diana forced herself to leave the letter in her pocket until she reached the park. Halting at the first seat, she looked around before removing it. Impatient, she accidentally tore the single sheet of paper. Jigsawing it together she read,
I have to see you. I will be at the bandstand in the park at one o’clock on Monday and Tuesday afternoons. If you don’t come, I will visit you on Wednesday in Wyn’s house. I know where it is.
Tony
She looked at her watch, it was twelve-thirty. She had promised Wyn that Tony wouldn’t make any difference to their marriage, but if she didn’t meet Tony, and he did visit the house there was no predicting what he might say or do, and probably within earshot of Wyn’s father.
She sank her face into her hands. Why did life have to be so complicated? It had all seemed so simple when Wyn had asked her to marry him. They had set up home, created a haven for themselves and Billy outside of the world, but between Erik and Tony it now looked as though the world was beating a path to their door. Why wouldn’t people allow them to live in peace?
‘That wasn’t exactly what I had in mind when I invited you for lunch.’ Huw surveyed the remnants of their meal. He’d wanted to buy Myrtle something special, but the Ministry of Food directive that protein was to be included in only one course of a restaurant meal, and the limited menus outside most places that no amount of imaginative labelling could conceal consisted of variations on vegetable stews, had led them to a small coffee shop in the Royal Arcade. The blackboard in the window had promised beef fritters, mashed potatoes and carrots, but the description had proved more impressive than the reality. There was more batter, mashed potatoes and carrot in the fritters than the occasional greyish strand that might have been meat or – as one of their neighbouring diners had suggested – gun-cotton.
‘It was fine,’ Myrtle lied valiantly.
‘Do you have any pudding?’ he asked the waitress as she approached to clear their plates.
‘Danish Apple or prune flan,’ she answered briskly.
‘Custard?’ Huw ventured hopefully.
The waitress shook her head. ‘But we do have mock cream, sir. It’s sixpence extra.’
‘Just the Danish Apple pudding, please,’ Myrtle said shyly, hoping the apples would take away the cloying, greasy taste of the fritters.
‘You sure you don’t want the mock cream?’ Huw urged, wanting to spare no expense.
‘No disrespect intended, but if it’s anything like the mock cream I’ve eaten in the canteen at work I’d rather not.’
‘Can’t say I blame you, madam.’ The waitress poised her pencil over her pad. ‘Just the one Danish Apple?’
‘Make that two,’ Huw looked to Myrtle. ‘And coffee?’
‘That would be nice.’
‘Let’s hope the pudding is better than the meal,’ he said, as soon as the waitress was out of earshot.
‘It wasn’t that bad.’
‘No?’
‘I’ve eaten worse in the canteen.’
‘This isn’t a canteen.’
‘It’s just good to be outside the factory.’ She looked at her watch. ‘On a normal working day I’d still have three hours of my shift to go. But instead of being tied to a bench, straining my eyes and cramping my fingers, here I am being waited on hand and foot, with window shopping and a film to look forward to, and nothing to do until tomorrow morning. So,’ she smiled, ‘this is absolute bliss.’
‘It is good not to be working,’ he agreed.
‘What would you be doing now?’
‘Depends on what shift I was on. If it was nights, I’d be thinking of getting up.’
‘You live alone, don’t you?’ she asked, knowing full well he did from her conversations with Megan.
‘Have done for the last twenty years, ever since my father died.’
‘Aren’t you ever lonely?’ She flushed as she realised the implications of her casual remark.
‘Sometimes,’ he admitted. ‘But then, I’ve always tried to help Megan out with William and Diana. Diana never knew her father, and William can only just about remember him going off to war, but then Megan’s probably told you that. Megan was the only girl in our family, and the baby,’ he smiled, ‘although there’s only two years between us. When our brothers left for London, I felt it was up to me to look after her. I spent a lot of my free time with her and the children when they were growing up. Well, as much as she and the force would let me,’ he amended. ‘So in a way they’ve been my family. And, being a policeman I spend most of my working hours with people, but not always the kind I like. After a particularly hectic day a bit of peace and quiet doesn’t go amiss.’
‘I suppose not,’ she murmured, disappointed at his response.
‘Mind you, peace and quiet can’t compare with the right kind of company, like now.’ He leaned back as the waitress put two small portions of pudding in front of them. ‘There’s more breadcrumbs than apple,’ he complained.
‘At least what there is looks like real apple.’ Myrtle cut into the mess with a spoon. ‘And it is,’ she declared after she’d tasted it.
‘What were you expecting?’
‘Carrots. All we get for pudding in the canteen is carrots in disguise. Yesterday it was mock apricot flan, which meant they mixed them with plum jam, the day before almond flan, which turned out to be carrots soaked in almond flavouring. But then with what it’s costing in merchant seamen’s lives to bring food into the country, it’s unpatriotic to complain.’
‘I quite agree, so let’s toast victory.’ He lifted his coffee cup to hers. ‘Are there any shops you’d particularly like to visit?’
‘I wouldn’t mind taking a look at anything that’s on offer.’
‘Clothes?’ he asked apprehensively, cringing at the thought of trailing behind Myrtle in a lingerie department.
‘Food. Megan does a wonderful job with our ration cards, but if there’s anything extra or different to be had here I’d like to take a treat back.’
‘We’ll see what we can do.’ He took out his pocket watch and opened it. ‘The film doesn’t start for another two hours, so we’ll have plenty of time to sniff out a surprise.’ He slipped his hand into his inside pocket and pulled out his wallet before signalling to the waitress.
‘I’ll go and powder my nose.’ Myrtle went into the tiny toilet cubicle, opened her handbag and reached for her last bottle of pre-war eau-de-Cologne. Splashing it on to her hanky and wrists, she studied her face in the mirror then dabbed on an extra layer of powder. She had no illusions about her looks. The last twenty years had added a stone to her figure and unmistakable lines around her mouth and her eyes. Even as a young girl she had never been pretty. Before Huw, only two men had asked her out. Twenty years before, when she’d been eighteen and her mother had still been alive, she’d gone to a chapel concert with a young minister, and when she was twenty a lay preacher had taken her to a lecture on the Holy Land. Her father had insisted on meeting and interrogating both men, and neither had wanted to repeat the experience after facing him.
At least she and Huw were talking without too many embarrassing silences, and perhaps, if she kept their friendship from her father, there would be more outings. It made no difference that her father knew and liked Huw. He liked him because he was Megan’s older brother and a policeman. The moment he found out that she had been seeing Huw alone, he’d order her to stop behaving like a lovesick schoolgirl and attend to her duties in the house. The notion of her having an independent life away from her family and home had always upset him, and it had taken all of Megan and Diana’s powers of persuasion to induce him to give his consent to her working in the factory.
Pushing her compact and scent back into her bag, she checked the seams on her only pair of stockings and returned to the café.
‘Ready?’
She followed Huw to the door, debating the best way to let him know just how much she was enjoying herself. Would it be so forward of her to tell him?
Diana sat on the park bench, watching the seconds tick by on the gold wristwatch Wyn had presented to her to mark Billy’s birth. If Tony hadn’t offered her the option of meeting him today or tomorrow, she would have felt compelled to walk across the park to the bandstand. As it was, she couldn’t bear the thought of confronting him. Not now. Tomorrow, perhaps? After she had spoken to Wyn. But would it be better to keep Tony’s letter from her husband? After all, she had told Wyn that Tony was nothing to do with them, or their marriage.
Her mind a turmoil of doubt and indecision she left the bench and retraced her steps over the bridge and into the town. She hesitated at the entrance to Taff Street. Where could she go? Home? Her mother would take one look at her and realise something was wrong, and the last thing she wanted was an inquisition with Wyn’s father sitting in the kitchen. Besides, her mother’s health hadn’t been strong since she had been released from prison. It wouldn’t be right to risk upsetting her by telling her the sordid truth about Billy’s real father, not when she and Wyn had worked so hard to convince both their families that everything was settled and happy between them. But she needed to talk to someone.
Bethan was the obvious choice, but these days her cousin was either working or sleeping. She barely had time for herself, let alone anyone else. Jane – they had been close when they had both lodged in her uncle’s house before they had married, but after being bombed out, Jane had enough troubles of her own. Phyllis? She’d be busy with Brian and with Bethan’s children, and Alma would be trying to get back into the routine of running the business after her mother’s funeral.
She had always been close to William, but she hadn’t dared tell him the real reason why she had stopped seeing Tony, for fear of what he might do to him. And he was married to Tina, Tony’s sister. There was no telling how the Ronconi girls might react if they found out they were related by blood as well as marriage to Billy.
Hardly knowing where she was going, she turned left, heading for the Tumble and the junction of Taff and High Street. She could call into the shops, but it was too early for the banking, and she felt too restless to serve behind a counter, especially on a Monday, traditionally one of the slowest days of the week.
She stopped outside the Tumble café. Perhaps she should call in on Will and Tina, not to tell them about her troubles, but just to talk, about something – anything – that would help take her mind off her problems. Pushing open the door she went inside. Two tram crews, both with conductresses wearing trousers, still considered a shocking sight in Pontypridd, were sitting in the back room. The front room was empty.
‘Diana, good to see you. Tea?’ Ronnie reached for a cup.
She looked around: there was no sign of William or Tina but she could hardly walk out just after she’d come in. ‘Yes please.’
‘You look as though you’ve lost a shilling and found sixpence.’
‘Just at a bit of a loose end. Monday’s always slow. It’s too early to do the banking, and too late to walk home to see Billy because as soon as I got there, I’d have to turn round and come back into town.’
‘Things have been so slow here, I’m glad of someone to talk to.’ He poured the tea and put it on the counter. ‘Sugar?’
‘Two please, if you can spare them. Seen any sign of my brother?’